Waking Up
by BuzzCat
Summary: Steve jumped and rolled out of bed, gun pulled from beside his bed before he even knew what woke him. Of course, the threat happened to be a mildly intoxicated intern from downstairs. Written for a prompt. AKA, Steve gets his first date in years


Steve jumped and rolled out of bed, gun pulled from beside his bed before he even knew what woke him. There was a loud thump from his living room and he could hear someone moving on the floor. He stayed close to the wall, carefully peeking around the corner. The lights weren't on and the lamp from his side table had fallen and smashed. Steve took a moment. He liked that lamp. The person on his floor stumbled up and whined,

"Jaaaaaaaane?" Steve sighed, flipped the safety on, and set the gun on the dresser by the door. It was Darcy, Jane's intern. Steve had seen her a couple times before in the hallway. She'd always smiled and said hi, but both of them were always busy and that was the extent of their conversation. He heard her often enough though. Normally as she herded Tony up to his floors of the Tower at five in the morning, or when she was trying to replace the pen in Jane's hand with a PopTart. Her voice always made him smile. Of course, he wasn't feeling all that smiley when she apparently climbed through his window, broke a lamp, and, judging by a furtive sniff of the general area, was obscenely drunk. Steve stepped into the living room,

"Darcy, this isn't Jane's room." She spun and saw him,

"Ah, fuck. Sorry, Cap. Didn't mean to wake you up. Must have miscounted how many balconies up I had to go." she said. Steve quirked an eyebrow at her,

"Why are you climbing balconies drunk?"

"Clint can do it! I can too! HA! Rub that in his smug little face tomorrow." she said. Steve rolled his eyes. Of course Clint would instigate this. He was going to have a talk with him about people who were not graced with amazing hand-eye coordination. Mostly about how he shouldn't encourage them to risk their lives. Steve flipped the light on and Darcy made a vague noise of protest, covering her eyes. He flipped the switch off,

"Sorry."

"'S good. Don't do it again. I am a creature of the shadows." she said. Steve snorted,

"I'll bet. Alright, where's your apartment at?" he asked. He could get a car to drive her.

"Fumigated. Can't go home for a few more days. I'm staying with Jane."

"Where's Jane's apartment?" he asked. Darcy shrugged,

"Somewhere kinda close to yours. I think."

"JARVIS?"

"I'm afraid that Miss Foster appears to have gone Asgard for the evening and as I do not have express permission from her for Miss Lewis to enter unaccompanied by Miss Foster, I cannot let her in." said the AI. Steve groaned. A quick glance back at the clock said that it was two in the morning. He was supposed to be awake in three hours. He didn't need a lot of sleep, but he needed a bit more than that. He scrubbed a hand down his face. Now that the adrenaline rush of an intruder in his room was gone, the tiredness was starting to come back. He carefully led Darcy to the bedroom, pushing her so she sat down on the bed. He bent to remove her shoes, only to find her barefoot.

"Took off the heels for climbing." said Darcy. Steve nodded,

"Right." He carefully removed her jacket so that Darcy was in a tanktop and skirt, which would have to do for impromptu pajamas. Darcy was already yawning and flopped onto his bed. She squirmed until she somehow managed to cover almost 75% of the bed. _How?_ thought Steve. It was a custom bed because he was a bit taller than the average man, yet she somehow managed to cover more than should be physically possible.

"Night-night, Cap." said Darcy, and then she was asleep. Steve put a garbage can next to the bed, just in case, and a glass of water with two Advil on the nightstand. Modern movies said that this was the type of thing people did when others were going to be hungover. Steve managed to wrestle a pillow away from Darcy's sprawled form and went back to the living room, covering up with a blanket off the couch and he slowly fell asleep.

The next morning, Darcy woke to find herself sprawled on a freakishly hard bed. This was not her bed, no way in hell. Opening mascara-crusted eyes, she found two pills and a glass of water beside her. Darcy quickly downed both and sat up, stretching and feeling her muscles pop into place. She took stock of herself: Head, still hurt. Clothes, still mostly on. Lady bits, situation normal. Alright, so no sex had happened, which Darcy was glad of. She stood and squinted her eyes as she left the bedroom. The rest of the apartment was done in the telltale decoration of Tony Stark, which immediately put to rest most of Darcy's fears. The only people who lived in the Tower were Avengers and friends, all of whom Darcy had at least seen around and most of them were friends with her. She heard the key in the lock and blinked in surprise when Steve Rogers walked in. He was sweating and Darcy took a moment to appreciate the way that his t-shirt clung to him. She waved awkwardly at him,

"Hi."

"Hello." he said, nodding in acknowledgement. Darcy rubbed a hand down her arm. Now that she was out of bed, it was a little brisk.

"So, thanks for letting my drunk ass crash yesterday." she said. Steve shrugged,

"No problem. You were climbing balconies sixty stories up while drunk. It seemed a little…you're welcome." Bucky had always said that the babbled too much around dames. Darcy shook her head,

"I'll have to have a stern conversation with my drunk self about hand-eye coordination impairment and the dangers thereof." she said. Steve didn't really know what to say to that. Darcy sighed, "Alright, well, no rest for the wicked. I'll grab my jacket and get out of your freakishly well-done hair. But we should get coffee sometime. Or dinner and a movie. I have to thank you for letting me crash."

"Sounds like a plan." said Steve with a smile. Darcy grinned, ducking into the bedroom and grabbing her jacket and squeaking past Steve in the tiny entryway. She was out the door before Steve could say anything. As she walked down the hall, Steve smiled. He was pretty sure he had his first date in seventy years.


End file.
